KirstenL4W

Ok, I figure I’ve done a long enough dramatic pause after the first part of this post.  Now you get to find out the current state of my education.

I did find a great job last summer, and was there on a contract basis for about 6 months before I was finally hired on permanently.  It’s the kind of job I was heading for when I left the executive search firm back in October 2006, with the idea that I wanted a job with more room for growth.  I loved working in a small company, but there usually isn’t any room to advance in small companies.  I am now at a large company (technically a medium sized company since we have less than 5000 employees), but there are lots of opportunities.  My office looks like something out of Office Space, but nowhere near as dreadful.  I’m an admin in the finance department, and while the work is easy, I’m looking forward to the opportunities.

When I started looking for more opportunities, I had the idea in mind that I wanted to study accounting.  This is a subject that, while I did well in the class in college, I didn’t have a clue about it and therefore was not fond.  It’s hard to become excited about something that is all theoretical when it should be practical.  But in the working world I developed a fondness for it.  The principles of it don’t change, numbers keep the same rules wherever you go, and it’s something that you can take anywhere, from the biggest cities to the smallest towns.  Being in the finance department is like a dream come true in this regard.

Another wicked awesome thing is that my company has educational reimbursement.  I spoke to my boss about this the other day and told her of my intentions to become edumacated on their dime.  Since I already have my foot in the door there, I have the perfect setup to work my way up and learn lots of different areas of concentration while I go to school.  My boss likes my thinking as much as I do, so the plan is to sign up for a class as soon as the summer schedule comes out.  I have all my core classes done, with the exception of math, so I only need 12 classes for an associates degree.  After that I’ll transfer to a 4-year and continue on so I can earn a Bachelor’s degree.  After that, who knows.

Besides the abstract idea that I should go back to school, and finally deciding what I want to be when I grow up, I have been craving the academic life a bit lately.  On our Thursday night outings, Boyfriend and Big Bad Mama Detroit, who is a high school English teacher, often get into discussions that can take a literary turn.  I find myself missing English classes, since those are subjects that I always enjoyed and did well in.  While not something I want to do career-wise, literature and writing are almost exhilarating.  I consider myself to be somewhat well-read, but the fact that I can’t participate in their discussions as well as I’d like makes me feel like a bit of a dummy.  I feel that my writing suffers at times as well.  So many other blogs I read are so well-written, and I struggle with being able to express myself at times.  It’s like I don’t even know the words to be able to say what I want to say.  While I’m not specifically interested in increasing my vocabulary, I feel that my writing skills in general have become rusty.  I do want to earn my degree in Accounting, but after that I think it would be fun to take some lit and writing classes.

Another interest I have, that I would like to pursue on more of a leisure basis, is graphic and web design.  Ever since working for a graphic design firm, I have been somewhat interested in designing for print.  Having my blog has increased my technical interest, and I’d also love to be able to design my own themes and fully understand what I’m doing when I try to make my blog look the way I want.  But since I know exactly why it is that I want to learn these things, I don’t feel at this time that it would be prudent to invest that kind of money in a hobby.  Maybe someday I’ll do it on a personal interest level, but again, accounting is where it’s at for me.

It’s time to stop floundering around with my jobs.  I think that admin and retail jobs are largely professions that people fall into these days, rather than deliberately choosing them.  It’s time for me to get out of this place I’ve fallen into and take charge of my career.  It’s time to go back to school.

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